Thursday, 30 April 2015

Over one thousand residents of New
Kalukanya area of Mufulira District are leaving in fear following threats by
the Mufulira Municipal Council to demolish their houses.

The residents built their houses in an
illegal settlement, which the Council has described as an encroachment.

One of the residents who lost her houses in
a recent demolition exercise Emeldah Mulenga tearfully complained to ZNBC News
that her house which she built from retirement benefits was demolished without
notice.

"I constructed a slab for my house using retirement benefits my late husband left me with. Now the council has demolished it. I have even suffered a stroke which has left me with a painful eye," cried Mrs Mulenga who spoke in Bemba.

In November 2014, the Council demolished houses which were constructed illegally.

But residents are up in arms with the local authority for allowing them to pay fees for land which has now been deemed illegal.

"We are suffering here. We need the President Edgar Chagwa Lungu to intervene in our plight. Why should we suffer in our own land?" said Elizabeth Chungu, who also lost a house.

The land issue in New Kalukanya has taken a new twist as the local authority is now re-demarcating and selling the plots to new owners.

Chairperson of the displaced residents Henry Chanda says the action by the council is suspicious.

"Why are they shifting beacons? Why are they selling our plots to people we dont know? This is a syndicate. We will not accept this," said Mr Chanda.

But Mufulira Municipal Council
Assistant Public Relations Manager Melvin Mukela says the local authority is
doing everything possible to legalise the area but residents have not been
cooperative.

"We have called for several meetings but the residents don't show up. We have now asked them to pay K12,500 as penalty fee so that we can give them plot numbers and start processing their title deeds as a way of legalising the settlement," said Mr Mukela.

On Tuesday, the residents effected citizens arrest on two buildings inspectors from the Council who were found analysing plots in New Kalukanya and they were handed over to the Police.

New Kalukanya area has been contentious and it started growing in 2008 when some people who masqueraded as land owners sold plots in the area to unsuspecting Mufulira residents.

Tuesday, 28 April 2015

Long
queues at clinics and hospitals are a normal occurrence in Zambia, a country
that is plagued by various diseases such as HIV/AIDS, cholera and malaria.

The
lack of enough man power at health facilities is part of the problem that has
led to patients queuing at health facilities for long hours.

In
rural areas, the situation is even worse as patients walk several kilometers
from their villages to the clinic and spend more hours waiting to be attended
to.

Some
critically ill patients die on their way to the hospitals due to lack of proper
roads and ambulances in rural areas.

And
in some health facilities, there are no trained medical personnel to attend to
patients.

In
some areas, cleaners and office orderlies who are not trained in medicine,
attend to patients and give out prescriptions.

Currently,
Zambia has 1,500 doctors and has a shortage of 3,000 more.

At
the University Teaching Hospital, Zambia’s largest health referral center in
Lusaka, doctors are overwhelmed with work.

Some
give out appointments to patients six months or a year away.

This
situation has led to patients dying as they wait for their appointments.

And
some doctors have also started running their own private clinics to cash in on
the shortage of doctors.

According
to some patients, doctors give them long appointments or encourage them to visit
their private clinics where there are no queues and they can be attended to the
same day.

According
to the World Health Organisation, the normal doctor-patient ratio is 1 doctor
per 5,000 patients but Zambia has one of the most abnormal doctor-patient ratio
which now stands at 1 doctor per 12,000 patients.

At
present, Zambia only has two government run institutions that train doctors
plus a few private ones and their output is not enough to reduce the deficit in
the coming years.

The
University of Zambia and the Copperbelt University produce about 200 doctors
per year and at the rate at which these medical personnel seek greener pastures
abroad, the number of doctors in Zambia may not reach the required level.

To
try and mitigate this problem, the Zambian government and the Jewish Council of
Zambia have partnered to construct a school of medicine in the northern city of
Ndola which is projected to produce doctors on an annual basis.

The
School will be under the Kitwe-based Copperbelt University whose current School
of Medicine is squatting at the Ndola Central Hospital were there is inadequate
space for students.

The
US$5 million project has already progressed and is scheduled to be completed in
June 2015.

Sogecoa
Zambia Limited, the Chinese construction company which is constructing the
school, is scheduled to complete phase one of the project in June and hand it
over to government.

Professor Kasonde Bowa

Dean
of the School of Medicine at the Copperbelt University Professor Kasonde Bowa
says it can take Zambia over 15 years to produce the 3,000 needed doctors if
nothing is done to improve the training of doctors.

“Currently,
the University of Zambia and Copperbelt University will take over a decade to
offset the deficit. But with the new school of university under construction,
it will only take less than 7 years to normalize the doctor-patient ratio,”
said Professor Bowa.

According
to the plans by the Copperbelt University, the School of Medicine will be
producing 250 doctors and 50 dentists on an annual basis.

This
effort, though a bit insignificant, will help beef up the numbers for medical
personnel in Zambia to reduce the long queues patients have become used to when
they are seeking medical attention.

Thursday, 23 April 2015

Community Development Minister Emmerine Kabanshi has
launched the K400 million Millennium Development Goals Initiative (MDGI)
which is aimed at reducing the deaths of women and children in two provinces.

The four year initiative which is funded by the European
Union and implemented by the Zambian government and UNICEF, will be implemented
in eleven districts of Lusaka and Copperbelt Province.

At the launch of the project in Masaiti District on Wednesday last week,
Ms Kabanshi said the reduced child and mortality rates as revealed by the
Zambia Demographic Health Survey are still unacceptably high hence the launch
of the MDGI.

She said the initiative will help improve health and
nutrition among children and women.

As part of the project, UNICEF representative Laston Chitembo handed over a wheelchair, labour ward utensils and other medical kits
worth over K700,000 to Kashitu Health Center in Masaiti District.

During the four year project, the cooperating partners will
donate land cruisers, motorcycle ambulances, surgical kits, wheelchairs,
stretchers and operating theatre tables to various health facilities.

This equipment will help in increasing access to health by
women and children and reduce deaths.

According to the preliminary report of the 2014 Zambia Demographic Health Survey, Zambia recorded a reduction in the maternal mortality rate from 591 to 398 deaths out of 100,000 live births from 2007 to 2013.

However, stakeholders are still worried that the figures are still high for a developing country which is losing a lot of mothers and children during delivery.

Long distances to health centers and lack of medical personnel and ambulances has added to the many challenges needed to reduce the maternal mortality rates in Zambia.

Saturday, 18 April 2015

In a democracy like Zambia's, transparency is a critical component to good governance.

In the political arena, campaigns and elections are supposed to be held in the most transparent manner if democracy is to be deemed mature.

But stories of vote buying, rigging, voter intimidation and several other electoral malpractices are common in most African countries.

In Zambia, most times when opposition political parties lose elections (including by-elections), stories of vote rigging are common.

But new technologies may soon prove to be a solution to the issue of transparency and good governance in Africa.

Since 2011, all elections in Zambia have come under scrutiny by the citizens through the use of Information Communications Technologies (ICTs).

With the latest figures showing that there are about 9 million Zambians who have registered their sim cards with the Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA), the use of these phones to get election updates has increased over the years.

According to ZICTA, 3 million of the 9 million phone owners have access to the internet and most Zambians use them for Facebook and Twitter.

PF's PVT results for Chawama

Through such ICT platforms like the Parallel Voter Tabulation (PVT) which the then opposition Patriotic Front (PF) used to monitor and ascertain the results of the 2011 General Elections, the use of ICTs has become an indispensable tool in elections in Zambia.

On September 11, 2014 the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) piloted the electronic transmission of results for the Kasenengwa parliamentary by-election in the Eastern province.

Using mobile phones and computers to collect and transmit results, the ECZ was able to announce final results within 12 hours of the last ballot having been cast.

This use of ICTs to collect election results made the declaration of the winner faster as opposed to the manual system were the ECZ relied on the Zambia Airforce to transport ballot boxes from remote areas to the collation center on Chipata which would have taken more time.

During the 20 January, 2015 presidential election, the civil society also used ICTs to monitor and update the nation on the election results.

For example, Transparency International Zambia (TIZ) gathered election results per constituency and posted results on its Facebook page from time to time as seen in the screen shot above.

Millions of Zambia who are on Facebook, stayed glued online to get updates from TIZ, political parties, individuals and other civil society organisations who were posting results from their PVT centers.

And last week during the parliamentary by-elections in Chawama, Masaiti and Senga Hill, various political parties used mobile phones to gather election results from their dozens of polling agents who were spread across the polling stations in the three constituencies.

As can be seen in the screen shots from PF's Miles Sampa (above) and UPND's Honourable Cheche Kalala (right), political parties compiled their respective election results before the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) announced its official results.

Cheche Kalala of UPND posting PVT results

These were authentic election results pasted outside polling stations after being officially announced by electoral officers at each polling station and sent back to each political party's PVT center in Lusaka by polling agents through Short Message Service (SMS).

Using this PVT system has proved to be so effective and political parties in Zambia even know before the ECZ announces its results as to who has won elections and with how many votes.

These ICT tools have also helped increase the confidence citizens have in the management of elections in the country.

With the citizens participating in verifying these election results using mobile phones and the internet, cases of rigging are now being done away with as voters can now compare results announced at each polling station and the official figures announced by ECZ at the collation centers.

Thursday, 16 April 2015

Unemployment in the mining town of Chingola is an everyday
issue which some residents grapple with.

For some months now, 1, 000 Chingola-based former
Armcor Security Company workers have been roaming the streets looking for jobs.

These workers are among six thousand from across the country
who lost their jobs after Armcor was liquidated.

"We are now being laughed at. Our children have been sent away from school because we have failed to pay school fees," said Mischeck Chinyemba, a former Armcor worker.

Annie Lumuni is a former Supervisor at Armcor who also lost
her job last year after serving the company for eight years.

She lives in Chingola’s mine area and has decided not to
just sit and wait for her terminal benefits.

"I make crackers and sale to the public to earn a living. Life is hard here. Just this month we have lost two former workers. They have left their money," she said.

Following Armcor Security’s liquidation in 2014, Konkola
Copper Mines which had contracted it to provide security at the mines,
delivered cheques K1.1 billion kwacha to the Chingola District
Commissioner’s office for the retrenched workers’ benefits.

But Acting Chingola District Commissioner Phillip Kalima declined to comment on the matter referring all queries to the liquidators.

And when reached for a comment, Armcor Security Company
liquidator Felix Chisambo said thecheques where in his possession.

Mr Chisambo said he was assessing each of the 6,000 former worker’s benefits before he can issue out individual letters and payments.

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About The Author

Paul Shalala is a Kitwe-based reporter for the Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation, the country's national broadcaster which runs two TV channels and three radio channels. He was recently elected as Secretary (Northern Region) 2016 - 2018 term for the Zambia Union of Broadcasters and other Information Disseminators. On The Zambian Analyst, he blogs about politics, elections, governance and other issues of national and international interest. He previously worked for MUVI Television, New Vision Newspaper and freelanced for The London Evening Post. He has been trained in various specialised journalism courses in Ethiopia, Germany, Ghana, South Africa, Uganda and Zambia. He was awarded the 2016 Mandela Washington Fellowship and studied Public Management at Syracuse University in New York. He has so far reported from Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Africa and North America. Paul has a number of local and international media awards to his credit. Paul is also the the founder and Managing Director for PAMOS Media Consultancy (www.pamosmedia.com) a company which is training 100 Zambian journalists in budget tracking and investigative journalism skills funded by the US Government